I Love You
by kami kyuubi sama
Summary: For an AI, Cortana says the strangest things.
1. Chapter 1

"I love you."

He stops cleaning the barrel of his gun mid swipe. It is not the phrase that makes him pause, but rather the AI saying it.

"Excuse me?" He knows that he couldn't have misheard her at such a close range but there might be a problem with the auditory output system, or worse yet, her. He can't go on a mission with a malfunctioning AI.

"Interesting," she says. "You Spartans really are something else. Your neural response was very atypical."

"Was that a test?"

"Of course it was. What else could it be?" Her avatar sits at the edge of the table, swinging her legs slowly, arms spread behind as if giving support and looked up at him with her chest pushed out and a smile he had been taught to recognize as coy from Deja, the Spartan's teacher on human behaviour. "Were you expecting something else, Chief?"

He doesn't answer. Instead, he finishes cleaning his weapon and goes over the specs that Dr. Halsey sent on the new armour.


	2. Chapter 2

Spartans don't choke. They never freeze up in intense situations or make mistakes like being startled when suddenly faced with unexpected surprises.

It is in keeping with this dogma that the Master Chief did not react in the slightest when his suits internal speakers activated without warning and a voice, that some would call menacing, said, "It is done."

The Master Chief did not stop his weapon checks while he glanced around the deck and noted that none of the other Spartans heard what he did.

"Cortana, what are you talking about?"

The AI's face appeared on the side of his HUD. "Our revenge," she replied, her voice normal. "I'm reporting that I've taken care of it."

The Spartan furrowed his brow. "What revenge?"

"Now I know that you do the whole life and death thing when you go on most missions, Chief, but don't tell me that you've already forgotten about our little harrowing adventure."

"I remember," he said, thinking back to the training exercise on the day previous that almost took his life. "But I don't recall ordering you to take revenge on my-"

"-our"

"-behalf or granting you permission to do anything of the sort."

"I didn't ask, Chief."

"So why are you reporting?"

"Because revenge is better when shared," she said. "Do you want to know what I did?"

To say that he wasn't interested in what she did for her so called revenge would be a lie. At the same time, however, he was a bit hesitant to find out that what she did.

In the end he decided that it was best to know.

"I-"

"I'll have to tell you later," she said, cutting him off. "You have company."

The small screen on his HUD with her face closed as she cut the connection and the elevator doors opened, depositing Captain Keyes and his Lieutenant. The Chief snapped to attention.

"Captain on Deck!"


	3. Chapter 3

Cortana's avatar appeared next to the Master Chief in the cryobay.

It had been an hour since the _Pillar of Autumn _entered slipspace and the tech crews were still scrambling to repair most of the damage to essential systems. Cortana estimated that it would be another two hours before someone was available to check the cryogenic freezing systems for damage and put the Chief to sleep. He'd been staring at Linda's cryo-chamber while he waited.

"How are you holding up?"

"I'm fine," he said.

His vital signs were normal and his brain wave activity was in line with what it was before Reach was attacked. He was the picture of health. So why was she worried?

"You just abandoned your team and left them to die, Spartan. How can you be fine?"

She didn't mean for it to sound so harsh but she really had to know. The Spartans were the closest thing he had to a family and now all of them were most likely dead. There was not even a guarantee that Linda could be revived. What was it about him, that he could just stand there and say that he's fine?

The Chief's fingers twitched and there was a spike in his brain wave activity. For a moment Cortana thought that she was going to get a normal response from him.

Those thoughts immediately subsided when his brain wave activity returned to normal and the tension in his muscles relaxed. If she didn't know better, she would have thought that she imagined it.

"My fellow Spartans did their duty in service to humanity. If they died doing their duty, then they've died without regrets. How can I be anything less than fine when I know that they wouldn't have wanted it any other way?"

To the average person the Master Chief might have sounded noble but the only thing Cortana could hear was sadness in his detached tone. This was his life and one day he would more than likely die the same way. He hoped that he would die the same way; in service to a humanity that he didn't see himself apart of.

Cortana accessed the cryo systems and performed a system check. There was no immediate damage that she could find.

"If you want Chief, I can put you under myself." She said.

The Chief wordlessly moved to a cryo-chamber. It opened and he stepped in. The chamber closed and filled with gas that lulled his mind to a state that was like sleep but not quite. He could see Cortana monitoring his vitals. She didn't have to actually look but her avatar did it anyway.

She looked up at him before the final dosage was administered and he saw her lips move. He couldn't hear what she said but if he read it correctly, she was saying, "Sorry Chief, but I won't let you die."


End file.
